Sorry Republicans, impeachment isn't a coup

[BloombergOpinion]( [Early Returns]( [Jonathan Bernstein]( Get Jonathan Bernstein’s newsletter every morning in your inbox. [Click here to subscribe](hash=b9b2681361bede0e1069ca238efb1ec2). I try not to react to every silly piece of partisan spin, but one got to me this week: House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said on Fox News that the impeachment of President Donald Trump is a “[calculated coup](.” This was similar to the White House line that Democrats are trying to “[overturn](” the 2016 election, and it was equally nonsensical. If Trump is impeached and removed from office, Hillary Clinton would not become president. Mike Pence, the vice president selected by Trump himself, would. Trump’s staff might well stay put. Gerald Ford retained President Richard Nixon’s chief of staff, Alexander Haig, for weeks in 1974, then eventually replaced him with Donald Rumsfeld, whom Nixon had appointed to a series of positions. Trump’s cabinet would in all likelihood remain in place, along with hundreds of his lower-level nominees. All the laws that Trump has signed would still be laws. All the judges he has put in place would stay on the federal bench; even those still awaiting confirmation wouldn’t be affected except in the highly unlikely event that Pence withdrew them. Pence might adjust course on some policy questions, but he also could prove better at presidenting than Trump — who has been repeatedly stymied by the bureaucracy, the courts, Congress and more — and thus more effective at advancing Republican priorities. Perhaps it’s also worth spelling out that attempting to oust the president through lawful procedures simply does not meet the [definition of a coup](. A coup implies extra-constitutional actions, which impeachment and removal certainly are not. Even a metaphorical coup would presumably involve removing a political party from power. That’s just not happening. If the White House resorted to such a talking point, I’d say it was badly overwrought. But for McCarthy to do so is much worse. He isn’t just saying that Democrats are mounting a coup; he’s implying that at least 20 Republicans would be in on it, since removing Trump requires a bipartisan supermajority of 67 votes in the Senate. It’s all the more inflammatory since under any plausible scenario in which Trump was removed, the vote would likely have overwhelming support and a solid majority of Republicans behind it. That’s what happened with Nixon in 1974: Although conservative Republicans and most moderates had stuck with the president for months, virtually all of them abandoned him at the end, at which point he resigned. This impeachment process probably won’t end with Trump’s ouster. But if it does, it will likely look a lot like Nixon’s. Which means that the president’s removal won’t come down to anything that Democrats or even Republican Trump skeptics do. It will only happen if Republicans similar to McCarthy — and probably including McCarthy — decide that the president is unfit for office. Taking McCarthy’s accusation to its logical conclusion thus implies that he himself is in on the coup. In other words, like many Republican defenses of Donald Trump at this point, it makes no sense. No doubt this is partly because the White House [can’t get its act together]( in the president’s own defense. But it also demonstrates one downside of a loyal partisan press. If politicians know they won’t be challenged to come up with something coherent when talking to Fox News, they won’t try very hard. Will this cost Trump in the impeachment fight? I don’t know for sure. But I wouldn’t bet against it. 1. Julia Marin Hellwege at Mischiefs of Faction on voting and representation [in U.S. territories](. 2. Geoffrey Gertz at the Monkey Cage on [TikTok and national security](. 3. Perry Bacon Jr. on [electability](. 4. Nicole Hemmer argues that Republicans won’t turn against Trump because they’re no longer [connected to public opinion](. I’m not sure how far this goes. As I’ve said, don’t watch the polling on impeachment or removal; watch Trump’s approval ratings. If they fall significantly, pressure will build on Republicans, and I don’t think anyone knows how things would then play out. 5. My Bloomberg Opinion colleague Justin Fox on [the stock market during Trump’s presidency](. 6. Lawfare has posted [summaries of the House impeachment depositions](. 7. Christina Koch and Jessica Meir on [their joint spacewalk](. 8. And one I missed from last week. I voted! Texas puts constitutional measures approved by the legislature on the November ballot in odd-numbered years, and very few people vote. There were 10 ballot measures, most of them extremely obscure; I think only one of them had any kind of campaign for or against it. Turnout in my county surged up to about … 10%. That’s democracy, I suppose, but not exactly. This year, I’ve participated in three elections and cast 13 votes. It was the ninth Election Day of the four-year cycle, and I’ve now cast 158 votes since November 2016. That’s more than people in some nations cast in a lifetime of showing up for every single election. Here, it’s three year’s worth, averaging three Election Days a year, with plenty more to come in 2020. Get Early Returns every morning in your inbox. [Click here to subscribe](hash=b9b2681361bede0e1069ca238efb1ec2). Also subscribe to [Bloomberg All Access]( and get much, much more. You’ll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, the Bloomberg Open and the Bloomberg Close. Bloomberg L.P. ● 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10022 [Web]( ● [Facebook]( ● [Twitter]( [Feedback]( ● [Unsubscribe](